


Bylines

by Valkirin



Series: The Adventures of Lois Lane and Friends [1]
Category: DC Animated Universe, DCU (Comics)
Genre: Gen, Identity Reveal, Journalism, Secret Identity
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-02-14
Updated: 2017-02-21
Packaged: 2018-09-24 11:01:06
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 4,291
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9720776
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Valkirin/pseuds/Valkirin
Summary: Halfway through complaining that the image above her latest Superman column makes Superman look like Clark, Lois realizes that Clark looks a lot like Superman. Suddenly Clark wants to talk and Lois is not ready to chase a lead.





	1. New Angle

**Author's Note:**

> _This story started as side notes and background details in its sequel, but a combination of great feedback on that story and in discussions with[TheDoktor](https://archiveofourown.org/users/TheDoktor/pseuds/TheDoktor) helped expand a few orphaned paragraphs into a few chapters._

Lois kicked her feet up onto Clark’s desk. He was on his fourth bathroom break of the morning; it served him right if people used his ludicrously tidy desk as a footrest. She had her notes spread across her own desk and a blank document open on her computer screen. She also had no idea how to make her dull article about LexCorp’s new property developments anything fascinating. Lex Luthor of all people had been elected president and his successor as CEO was an unknown outsider. Lois’s best sneaks didn’t have much to say about Talia Head. 

Jimmy waved the Daily Planet’s latest print over the notes she wasn’t reading. “Don’t blame me, the new intern took it,” he said. When he had her attention, he unfolded the paper to reveal the front page. Her latest article was above the fold with a picture. The title wasn’t completely awful, for once, as it stuck exactly to the story. ‘Superman Averts Tragedy After Bridge Collapses’ was a true recounting and Lois rather liked how the interviews with officials on the scene had gone. The local paramedics were happy to detail that Superman used their back boards and other equipment when moving people with neck and back injuries. Someone in the editing department had even put together an infographic about the guidelines for moving people with spine injuries. That had let Lois devote more of the article to several other area bridges that were considered high risk for collapse.

Lois had already looked over the image that should have accompanied her headline. Jimmy hadn’t been able to get on scene for the disaster itself while Superman was still there but he had several photos taken in the last week that would have done just fine. Instead, someone had chosen a cell phone picture the new intern must have taken. The photo left Superman’s face shadowed and dimmed the colors of his outfit. It looked like just the sort of somber and serious portrait that should go next to a tragedy, not a good day for Superman and the city, and definitely didn’t catch his most flattering angles. 

Lois flipped to A4. The infographic was exactly where she had expected and was more colorful if anything. “Sorry, Jimmy,” she said. “The page proof yesterday had one of yours and it fit a lot better.” 

“Perry thinks people are ready for something different, I guess. He’s said most of my photos look so similar people won’t think the picture really goes with the article.” 

Lois tucked the paper under her arm as she spun away from Clark’s desk and slid her feet back into the pumps left under her own desk. “Well maybe I’ll ask Perry where he’s getting his information. We get a lot of compliments about our Superman coverage. If he’s talking to the other editors in town again, we all know they’re jealous that their photos are inferior copies of yours. Some people find a pose they like and stick with it.” 

“I mean, I’m not going to just ask him to vary the poses more,” Jimmy agreed emphatically. “I mean, what would I say? Excuse me, Superman, but apparently people get bored of noticing that you just saved dozens of people again and still wear the same outfit. My editor wants to know if you’d consider a new hairstyle so he could have—hi Clark!—bragging rights when he and the rest of the Metropolis editors want to fight over whose papers is the most important.” 

Lois waved her folded paper at Clark as they passed. He didn’t look sick. She decided it was yet another occasion where he’d just have more bathroom breaks in a morning than she took in a week. Whatever got into him occasionally, he’d never passed stomach flu to her, so she tried not to tease him about a nervous bladder. Some days she did better than others.

Jimmy looked increasingly nervous as they moved toward Perry’s office. “Um. Lois?” 

She glanced back over her shoulder. “Jimmy. You know Perry and I will never be happy if we don’t occasionally yell insults at each other. If you’d rather stay back with Clark where it’s safe, you know you’ll still be my favorite photographer.” 

“Wouldn’t mind the occasional byline.” 

She tapped her paper against his side. “That’s the spirit. All my open notes are from my snooze of a story about the new LexCorp CEO and surface changes to the headquarters so feel free to steal that one for me. I’ve got nothing about her.” 

Perry’s door was open. She closed it on her way in and took the chair across his desk and spread the paper across his desk, offending photo up. Lois sat back and waited for the first salvo. 

“Lane, as I have told you and every other reporter in this building, you do not control your titles or what images may or may not accompany your titles.” Perry nudged his reading glasses farther up his nose as he studied her expression. “What is this really about?” 

“You said it yourself a year ago, Perry. People have a limited attention span for a favorite photographer until they’re dead. If you start thinking Jimmy’s work is boring, then what happens to him when you stop using his images for columns entirely?” 

He pulled the black-framed reading glasses off entirely, tossing them onto the paper so he could better rub the bridge of his nose between two fingers. “For heaven’s sake, Lane, I am not going to bounce Olsen because he’s had a couple weeks of dull photos. I also won’t bounce you when the boring article I want on my desk tomorrow afternoon turns out boring.” 

“If you want to see something else out of him, let him submit an article to the board,” Lois persisted. “We both know it wouldn’t happen all the time but you’re going to want another voice on Superman. Jimmy has a good rapport with him and I can’t be the only person in the building on his speed-dial.” 

“Olsen already has his foot in the door. If he wants you or Kent to edit up something he wrote, fine, you wouldn’t let him embarrass himself with something that doesn’t meet standards. Kent would do his best to have him not embarrassed at all.” As he reached for his reading glasses, Lois noticed that the black frames had landed in just the right position to almost make it look like Superman was wearing glasses. She had to re-imagine the scale, of course, but that was easy enough. 

“You didn’t hire me to be nice,” Lois agreed. “You did hire me to tell people the truth though, Perry, and don’t get me started on this post-modernism bullshit. I don’t care if you have two dozen phone calls a day to complaints insisting Superman can’t be that good. He is. We don’t need to add shadows and murky coloring to make ourselves feel smarter.” 

“I keep you on the Superman column because you are going to follow your instincts. A lot of readers do assume you’re looking at him through rose-tinted glasses but I know you.” He roughly settled his reading glasses back into place. “You’ll tell people what they need to know. I hardly think this photo is as bad as you’re thinking, though. I picked this one because it was from the scene of the accident and it shows a different side to Superman. Color saturation isn’t the best, sure, but I wasn’t going to let someone screw around with color settings to make it prettier. Look at it again.” 

Lois huffed a sign but obligingly looked at the photo again. When she was past the shock of a different photo and the way that the grey paper washed out the remaining color, she was surprised to realize that the hazy expression almost lost in clouds of rubble and the shadow was a genuine smile. For once, he wasn’t posing for the photo or distracted with saving someone’s life. He was talking with someone, and by the angle and number of first responders on scene, he probably had been talking to her. 

Perry turned his monitor around. He must have called up the pictures while she was begrudgingly admiring the photo. On the computer monitor, the odd angle didn’t look nearly so shadowed. 

“I guess a little variety isn’t awful.” When she could see something past a shadowed slash of a jawline, she could tell Perry’s narrow-lensed glasses wouldn’t suit at all. “He just looks—” 

Lois’s voice stopped. Happily, she had lost all power of speech even as she lost her sanity, because Clark’s glasses would actually look rather nice on Superman. Clark’s smile would, too, and that angle made Superman look a lot like Clark. 

“Human,” Perry finished happily. He was pleased enough with her concession that he didn’t seem to notice she was trying to talk herself out of thinking like a crazy person. “Jimmy’s job is safe, really. I promise I’m not going to let the all-heroes-must-be-bad camp drag me into inaccurate reporting. I just wanted to show a different side and a sunlit calm photo at a press briefing had nothing on this. If I’d seen this before the final meeting yesterday it would’ve been in the proof.” 

Lois nodded. She was almost sure that was a sensible response to whatever her boss had just said. She suddenly wanted a glass of bourbon with a hearty side of denial. “Guess I’m still out of sorts from going all weekend.” 

“This article’s already getting us some good press. Work on your LexCorp story from home if you want,” Perry offered, benevolent in having the last word. “And tell Jimmy he’ll never get published if he doesn’t write an article!” he called as she fled with the newspaper in her hands. 

She should have paid more attention to the space between her and the safety of her desk chair. Lois bounced directly off of Clark's stupidly broad and well-muscled chest. She noticed with newly suspicious eyes that he was slumped a bit forward even as his shoulders sloped down a touch. He also had a familiar jawline and blue eyes and black hair and a concerned expression. She couldn’t bring herself to say ‘thank you’ when he gently caught her by the shoulder before she could crash into an intern carrying two trays of coffee. She felt like if she said one word far too many others would follow it. If she was right, he would have a hard time staying on as a coworker even if everyone in earshot kept their mouth shut, and if she had this wrong it would be a mental breakdown to scribe into Daily Planet legend. 

“Are you okay?” 

She closed her eyes and replayed the question. She was too frazzled to have a hope of comparing just yet, she decided, so she opened her eyes before Clark called for too many reinforcements. “Might’ve run myself a bit ragged with all that’s been going on,” she said lightly. He probably knew that she rarely used that tone and told the truth but she wasn’t ready to be honest. “Perry said I could take the LexCorp story home. Maybe I’ll work on it tonight.” 

“I could walk you home, if you wanted.” 

Clark looked the same. Even when she could try to imagine vivid red and blue instead of his pale blue button-down, even when she tried to edit the glasses away, it was the same way he always looked when he was worried about her. 

“No thanks,” she said. “Think I need to get some me-time.” She stepped carefully away from his hand on her shoulder. He tried to hide the flash of hurt, of course, because he always took it personally when she was having an awful day and she wouldn’t let him help. She swept all the folders on her desk into her black canvas messenger bag and logged off her computer. 

Even with the beginnings of far too much anger, however, Lois wasn’t willing to blame him just yet. “I’m going straight to my apartment,” she said. “I’m not on a case, I’m even going to call a cab because I’m not in the mood for more surprises today.” 

“Text me if you need anything?” 

If Clark kept being his usual helpful and kind-hearted self she would completely ignore the possibility that the man who couldn’t lie was keeping one of the world’s biggest secrets. “Sure,” Lois said. She bit her lip at how dismissive that had to sound from his perspective. She and Jimmy had been griping about her latest article and suddenly she doesn’t want to talk to anyone. “It’s been a long week. See you tomorrow?” 

“I’ll be around.” 

Lois waved before fleeing the building in record time. She wanted to write out an idea map and she didn’t want any witnesses. She flagged down a taxi gratifyingly quickly and for once didn’t watch the meter. She tracked cross-streets as a general precaution and paid in cash when the driver stopped directly in front of her building. 

She poured herself the promised half-glass of bourbon over the shrunken ice cubes left in her freezer. She might have been saving her Booker’s for a more traditional victory but this felt like a day that needed a stiff drink.

Lois had a Sharpie marker and several blank sheets of paper. She didn’t draw a single line. She opened the contact for Clark on her phone and compared her phone’s goofy candid shot to the intern’s shot taken at a downward angle. She knew that Clark and Superman had never talked to her at the same time unlike half of the Daily Planet. Clark had only made it just after Superman left.

She opened up her RSS feed about Superman instead. It seemed there had been three brief sightings that morning. That left time for one bit of incognito work or a real bathroom break. 

Clark was probably Superman. Superman was probably her dorky partner in journalism. She had fielded Superman questions from Clark and told Superman about Clark. 

Lois couldn’t decide if she was mad he hadn’t told her or if she was mortified she hadn’t figured it out sooner. She settled for being annoyed with the world in general and writing an obnoxiously dull article about the architecture of LexCorp’s new lobby as shown in materials from the latest press conference. No matter what people thought, she did write articles that weren't about Superman. They just happened to be less exciting.


	2. Olive Branch

Lois’s first day of sitting at her desk at the Planet knowing that Clark was Superman was perfectly abysmal. The draft article she’d put together while flying high on outrage and a bit of bourbon was so dull she actually refused to hand it in. That meant she was stuck at her desk the entire morning methodically piecing together a news piece about Lex Luthor’s former company. Worse, she was stuck at her desk while Clark tried to be solicitous and she just kept comparing notes in her head. 

She spent most of the day wondering how on earth he would have told her, anyway, which didn’t improve her temper. It was hardly fair to expect him to give such a substantial secret away to someone he didn’t trust, and by the time Clark knew if he wanted someone in on the truth, it would be a very big deal. It would be especially problematic if he ended up as the primary subject of his work partner’s most widely circulated articles. 

She handed a draft in to Perry before leaving the office to do the kind of legwork she’d usually pawn off on an intern. After several hours walking around downtown scouting out a few new places to stage interviews, she decided that she could at least give a hint to Clark that he wasn’t about to end up with his cover blown in one of her columns. 

The second time she walked into the Daily Planet knowing her partner was Superman, she had two cups of coffee. Lois ignored the receptionists just about cooing over her and especially ignored that the intern pool was all but cheering. Everyone adored Clark and the thriving gossip meant everyone knew Lois was mad. People at work had the idea that if she and Clark were fighting the entire building might collapse. That odd persistence lasted even in the ones that seemed to think Lois and Superman should go on a proper date. Lois thought it might have been better to not know Clark’s secret if only to spare herself the headaches. 

Lois set the clear plastic cup filled with frozen chocolate-flavored slush with hints of coffee on his desk. Clark nearly always ordered a small black coffee when she could drag him into a coffee shop. She blamed farmboy sensibilities. When coaxed enough to admit to a favorite drink, he liked ridiculous concoctions involving blended ice and whipped cream. 

“That’s the ‘we’re not talking about it’ coffee,” Clark said as he picked up the drink to peer at the contents. He took a long sip anyway. “We’re not talking about it yet?” 

Lois definitely didn’t deserve her partner. “Not yet,” she agreed. “If we’re talking I’d rather not be yelling the whole time. I’m still a tiny bit in a yelling mood but I’m working on it.” 

“It’s fine, Lois.” He raised his cup. She carefully knocked their drinks together. She’d sprung for a mocha, too, but hers was hot enough to burn non-superheroes. “I accepted the ‘not talking about it’ offering, we’re not talking about it. Did you want another pair of eyes on the LexCorp article? Perry told me to tell you he sent back first edits.” 

Lois decided to be smug she’d already brought apology coffee. Perry was a meddling busybody instead of someone forcing her to see sense. “Definitely could use the help. I dislike puff pieces in general. Puff pieces at all connected to Luthor leave me wanting to go pry up a floorboard somewhere and find some dirt.” 

“I still don’t understand how people could elect him,” Clark grumbled. “He’s not had many charges stick, sure, but you’d think people might decide he doesn’t keep very impressive company.” 

“He’s had enough smoke around him and his company that people ought to wonder about a fire.” 

Clark scowled. Whatever he was working on, it was something more serious than her article. The proposal from the last staff meeting about code violations at construction sites came to mind. “It’s like some executives only care about money. They don’t want to hear about workers becoming injured because someone ignored safety protocols and they don’t care that dozens of workers were laid off while they get a raise.” 

Lois awarded herself a bonus point for guessing correctly. “Don’t lump all the stuffed shirts together,” Lois coaxed. “Not all of them are so bad.” She scrambled for a minute while she realized that now she had to think of a CEO that wasn’t terrible to make the encouragement more than a platitude. “When it comes to an executive actually working with his company that really seems to care about his workers and his city- I think Bruce Wayne’s a good one.” 

Lois had no idea why that remark led to Clark spit-taking a mouthful of frozen mocha but the pure surprise on his face left her laughing. He looked a bit sheepish as he waved an apology at coworkers hit by aerosolized coffee but she thought they’d needed a joke. When he suggested several edits to turn the LexCorp piece into something suggesting that Metropolis would wait for CEO Talia Head’s first moves, she finally felt like they were on the same page. Even if he was Superman and she still couldn’t decide if she should be disappointed in herself or her friend.


	3. Contingency Planning

Lois had her entire kitchen table covered in various odds and ends when someone knocked on the door. She grabbed her not-precisely-legal can of bear mace and crept over toward the peephole. Clark was standing on the other side of her door looking rather woebegone and fairly doused in oil. His favorite light blue dress shirt only showed patches of blue between the black splotches.

She undid the chains on the door and pulled it open. With a more full view, she could see a coating of red-tinged dirt over the black oil. “Construction site?” 

“Accident,” he agreed. “Joke was on the foreman, though. I kept the donuts out of the oil and kept my appointment over in the break room. Several of the guys were smart enough that they wrote out answers and hints to get past the boss's eavesdropping.” Clark carefully pulled a sealed quart-size storage bag out of his pocket. The outside was coated in oil. The inside showed several loose pieces of paper, some covered in writing. 

“They got you again on the way out, too? Rough day.” 

Clark carefully left his shoes on the rubber mat she kept near the door. Lois grimaced at the look of his socks and grabbed two plastic grocery bags. “Here. You can borrow my shower as long as you use these over your socks. If you get all the oily things into a garbage bag first I'll dump them in my washer.” She did close two fingers over the oil-coated Ziploc bag. 

“Thanks, Lois.” 

She carefully moved the notes into a folder before tossing the bag into the garbage can. Two of the notes were in Spanish, she saw, and it turned out he had several informants promising that they had a friend who would mail further information later. 

Sometimes journalism was a very messy career. Lois had two spare outfits at Clark’s place for occasions just like this. He’d been very kind about the time some jerk tossed red paint over her favorite grey sheath dress. He’d even managed to get the red paint out through farmboy determination or heroics. He had a small pile of things in her bathroom cupboard behind the spare toilet paper. Thinking too much about that would lead to wondering where on earth he stashed his Superman outfit, though, so Lois went back to her earlier project. 

By the time Clark emerged from the bathroom in a clean outfit, she had nearly everything packed back into the brown leather satchel she kept in the front closet. She could hardly blame Clark for asking after he watched the last several items slot into place. She tucked a roll of twenty-dollar bills into an old wallet, checked the cap on her bear mace, and tucked both back where they belonged. 

“Going somewhere?” 

“I’m not planning on it,” Lois replied. “If I do have to run somewhere in a hurry, though, this has about everything I should need. I have cash, a few self-defense necessities, a few changes of clothes, a notebook…” She patted the leather bag after fixing the clasp back in place. “My grandmother used this as her briefcase. I care about it too much to use it every day, when oil is a risk, but I know she’d like having it as my panic-bag.” 

“Was she a journalist?” 

Lois smiled. “She was. She wrote under a man’s name and no one knew until her obituary. She wrote her own obit, of course, and I saved a clipping of every reaction opinion piece in print.” She hadn’t thought about that in ages. Her grandmother might have been able to keep her job, if the truth came out, but it would have been hard. Her editor had taken enough of a risk letting a woman write political opinion pieces. With only a thin biography available, the world had assumed L.E. Lane was a man and many readers had written letters to the editor praising her as a man of keen insight. 

“I feel like some people do their job at a newspaper without making it a full-contact support.” Clark smoothed down the front of his oil-free white shirt. “It’s a good idea, though, given the kind of work we end up chasing.” 

“Maybe you should start one of your own. I was just about to start dinner, want to work from here? The Metropolis Star scooped me on the dull piece about LexCorp architecture, happily, and even better it’s Perry’s fault for dithering so long about edits.” 

About five minutes before the chicken was done, Clark turned his head just slightly toward the window. Lois wondered how many times she’d missed the signs before and just how many times he’d fumbled for any excuse. This time, he wouldn’t need one. “I’m not going to be upset if you suddenly remembered you need to be elsewhere,” she said. “We’ll have time to talk eventually. See you at the Planet tomorrow?” 

“Sure.” He gathered up his notes carefully and accepted a plastic file-folder with a nod. “Thanks again. I’ll bring the coffee in the morning.” 

Halfway through dinner, Lois’s washer chimed. She shoved the thankfully oil-free clothing in the dryer and turned on the news. It turned out that Superman was in California after a sudden earthquake. He emerged from a ruined apartment complex while cameras rolled and carefully handed a little girl into the arms of waiting paramedics before flying back in. 

Figuring it out for herself was probably much better for her ego in the long term, Lois decided as she poured herself a well-deserved glass of bourbon. The worst liar in the city was keeping one of the biggest secrets in the world. It was past time he had someone to help him keep his stories straight.


End file.
